Monday, 16 September 2013

Y2015 ≠ X: Nigeria will survive.

Y2015 ≠X. Week 1

Dominant narratives in Nigeria’s
mind-space over the past two years have increasingly been about 2015! It would
indeed have been amazing if the furore about 2015 was related to development
targets such as consistent power supply across the country to decrease
manufacturing costs; decrease in unemployment rate to single digit by providing
more access to capital for SMEs as well as investing in human capital
development which will decrease the systemic security challenges faced by the
police and security services; increase in non-oil export to foreign markets
which will increase Nigeria’s prosperity; or even set that year as a target for
overhauling the health care system in this country etc; but no! Those are too
fancy a target for some narrative driving politicians and their supporting
agenda setting media. All they feed us with are: “Nigeria will break in 2015”,
“There will be war in 2015”,” Power must shift to the North”, “Jonathan must
run and win if Nigeria is to stay together”, “Jonathan is yet to declare”. Well
let me tell all of you, Nigeria will not break in 2015, there will not be war in
Nigeria, and Power must not shift to the North or anywhere else but its
destination should be in the hands of any democratically elected Nigerian
president who is blessed with enough wisdom to use it to the benefit of all!,
If Jonathan decides to run, that is his business; whether or not he will win
his party ticket is for whatever party platform he runs on to decide, the rest
will be for Nigerians to decide. If he loses, Nigeria will still dey kampe; we
do not care when and if he declares, he was sworn in to defend the constitution
and when his term is over, Nigerians can judge his performance and determine
his political fate.We will not allow
our fathers to drag their children into any blood shedding activity that is
driven by greed, selfishness and other parochial interests. There will not be
blood in 2015!Every normal Nigerian
across the breadth of our great country desire the same things: Jobs to earn a
decent living, access to good education, access to health care, security of
life and property. Hence the only destination of democratic power that
Nigerians want is that which can provide these things! Those politicians
incapable of understanding these should voluntarily retire from politics or
Nigerians will retire them.We cannot
continue to run a country where the relationship between the governing and
governed is patronage at its very core. Nigerians will wake up and demand for
the services we earnestly need and elect only those amongst us that we are
confident will provide us these services; not those who share bags of rice or
beans or throw money, our own money, at us like they are feeding dogs on the
street. Everybody wants power but what
do they want to use it for? That should be the litmus test in selecting a man
or woman to a given office! Let us forget how rich they are because the money
to be spent is our collective money, besides some of them are rich because they
stole from us while we were focused on some diversion or the other.

As citizens of our great country
it is our collective responsibility to participate in its governance on a daily
basis.Like irresponsible drivers who
sometimes take their hands of the steering wheel allowing the car to go off
course, we have not participated in Nigeria as much hence allowing it to drift;
now is the time however to begin paddling back Nigeria towards the course we
desire and succeed we will.

This is the first of weekly
“one-pagers” that I believe will reinforce the reasons why 2015 should not be
feared but embraced. Nigeria will not break up then or any other time; a simple
reason is this: Nigeria can only break up when we collectively break it up with
our hands, and since we are not ready to do that, who the hell can say
otherwise.